Understanding
by InsertImaginativeNameHere
Summary: Renee is home alone and is left to deal with an injured John. Set after 1x13
1. Renee

Understanding

Alone.

It was a Saturday evening and _Renée_ Chandler had once again been left to watch over Geraldine by herself. Though her sort-of-not-quite-ex-husband had been spending more time at home of late; after that thing with Faust or whatever his name was, they were together again, but he was still absent for large amounts of time. At least this time she knew where he was, helping some mutual friends finish moving, rather than the usual, less pleasant alternative; that being fighting supernatural entities with a truly obnoxious Englishman who _Renée still wasn't comfortable around. Sure, she understood why he did what he did and was the way he was much better now however that didn't mean she approved of his reckless attitude and often abrasive personality._

 _No, tonight she didn't have to worry about what might have been happening to Chas, short of his possibly getting squashed by homicidal furniture. She could curl up quite happily with a glass of wine and watch Orange is the New Black without that nagging concern in the back of her head that maybe this time he wouldn't come back. Either dying for good, or leaving her for a more interesting life. And even though she knew he would never do that, it didn't stop her worrying about him._

 _Just as she pressed play, however, there was a knock at the door. Mildly irritated, she paused the episode and went to answer it. Who could it be at this time, almost eleven o'clock? Opening the door, she prepared for late-night fanatics, trying to convert her, insomniac sales-people trying to foist some junk on her, or maybe some guy bringing pizza to the wrong address, or hell, even Father Christmas, anyone,_ _anyone_ _but a bloody and battered John Constantine, nose dripping, eyes swollen, painful smirk on his face._

 _"_ _Alright luv? 's Chas in?"_

 _"_ _Jesus Christ what the hell happened?" Renée took in the injuries of the man before her. There was a cut by his left eye, joining the steady nosebleed trickling down his face. He was slumped over more than usual, shifting from foot to foot as if it hurt to put weight on either for any length of time. His clothing was in disarray, not abnormal for him, but worse, white shirt stained with blood._

 _"_ _Doesn't matter. 's Chas in?" he repeated the question, more insistent. Desperate, even. Renée shook her head, about to explain where her husband was but John smiled a forced grin. "Never mind then." he turned away, starting to limp off. Renée sighed, putting on the nearest pair of shoes and going after him._

 _"_ _Wait," she said, taking him by the arm, surprised when he leant on her and didn't pull away. "You're in no state to go wandering off on your own. You need to see a doctor."_

 _"_ _People've been saying that to me for a long time," he chuckled darkly as she guided him inside. "I'll be fine."_

 _He fumbled as he tried to bend down and remove his shoes, swearing as he did so. Renée glared, a pointed look John carefully elected to ignore. If anyone was good at ignoring other people, it was him. Somehow he managed to remove his shoes and made it into the living room, where he promptly collapsed on the sofa and began reaching for a cigarette box that Renée snatched away from him._

 _"_ _No smoking in this house."_

 _"_ _Bollocks."_

 _"_ _And no swearing either," Renée met the exorcist's glare of hatred with ease. She hadn't grown up with three brothers for nothing. "Geraldine's sleeping upstairs and I don't want her picking up any more words from you. Not after she told her principal to 'sod off'. They had to google what it meant. I was called into school and completely humiliated."_

 _John laughed again, coughing as he did so, blood. He was coughing blood. Quickly he wiped it away, pretending it had never been there but Renée wasn't stupid, even if he was. She stood up to go and call an ambulance. Before she could get to the telephone, the idiot started trying to speak._

 _"_ _D'you, d'you have anything_ _to drink?" he managed, after a few uncertain starts._

 _"_ _Yes. Water." Renée said firmly. There was only one way to deal with somebody like this, and that was to set ground rules and stick to them. Worse than a child, he was._

 _"_ _It's a fucking totalitarian prison innit? Worse than bloody hospital. At least they give you painkillers there even if they are a bunch of wankers."_

 _"_ _Language." snapped Renée_

 _"_ _English." retorted Constantine, coughing again._

 _"_ _I'm going to call an ambulance now."_

 _"_ _No," John said, breathing raggedly, voice trailing off. "Please Renée?" he begged._

 _It was possibly the first time she'd ever heard John ask for anything politely._ _Please_ _he'd said, he'd actually said_ _please_ _, through choking breaths, best approximation of puppy dog eyes he was capable of on his face. Normally that wouldn't work on Renée, but in his pitiful state it made her feel unbearably sorry for the broken man on her sofa. All of his defences were down, arrogance and smirk wiped clean away, replaced with wounds and blood and probable broken ribs and_ _fear._ _And she decided just this once to relent, to go and fetch him a drink. God knew he needed it._

 _When she got back into the living room, beer in hand, she found he had passed out from the pain or from exhaustion – how exactly had he got here? - either/or. At first she stood there awkwardly, unsure of what to do, then she called, or tried to call, Chas. No answer. It looked like she was in this on her own. She headed upstairs to get a damp cloth to clean some of the blood off, and a blanket in the probable event of him staying the night. As she rant the tap, she heard Geraldine getting out of bed._

 _"_ _Mommy? What's going on?"_

 _"_ _Nothing sweetie," Renée lied._

 _The confused, sleepy little girl blinked a few times, rubbing her eyes. "I thought I heard you and Uncle John arguing."_

 _Uncle John._ _No matter how much Renée had tried to discourage her daughter from using that affectionate term of address, Geraldine had continued._ _Uncle_ _John. Geraldine was so innocent, could only see good in the man despite everything. It had been harder for Renée to even acknowledge John as Chas' closest friend, much less accept it. To give up trying to persuade her husband to keep away from his dangerous companion. But now she could see something quite clear and that was that John needed Chas to keep him safe. Otherwise he'd collapse on your sofa in a heap, bleeding and swearing and trembling. He really was a complete idiot, what else could he be? It was just who he was. And there was nothing she could do about that._

 _Renée sent her daughter to bed and headed back downstairs with a cloth and a blanket. John was still asleep, if you could call that sleep. Taking the cloth, she bathed the wounds around his eyes, cleaning some of the dried blood from his nose, which had stopped bleeding at last. Swollen, purple bruises were becoming visible now. They looked painful, tender to the touch and dark in colour, but John didn't wake as she washed his face. When she was done she set about removing that horrible scruffy coat he always wore, which smelt as though it hadn't been washed in years. Probably hadn't. That was going in the wash whether he liked it or not. Then, and she was hesitant about this, she removed his shirt. Under the numerous bruises she could see his tattoos, on his arms and chest. Not that she was an expert, but it felt like there were broken ribs. Were there? Maybe, maybe not. If he was lucky, he might have escaped relatively unscathed insofar as broken bones were concerned. How could she tell if he wouldn't let her call 911 for him? Forget that, she wasn't about to let anyone, not even John freaking Constantine, die on her sofa, under her watch. She was calling an ambulance for him and he couldn't stop her. Putting the blanket over him, she was just dialling the number when something stopped her abruptly._

 _Movement. A murmur. A_ _whimper_ _. Incoherent mumbling. Startled, she pulled back, thinking he was awake, but then she realised he was only dreaming. A dream? No, a nightmare. Tossing and turning, which couldn't be doing him any good at all. She tried to quieten him, but the dream seemed to only get more frantic, more terrifying._

 _"_ _No..." he moaned. "No!" sitting up, bolt upright, throwing the blanket off himself. He saw Renée leaning over him and jumped. "Christ on a fucking bike Renée you scared the shit out of me!"_

 _"_ _Are you okay?" she ventured, eyeing him cautiously as he reached for the beer she had left by the sofa._

 _Ignoring her, he took a sip and smirked. "Someone was keen to get me out my clothes. Always knew you secretly fancied me."_

 _Under any other circumstances that would have earned him a slap. But right here, right now, they reminded Renée of something Chas had said, once. Something she now recognised to be true._

 _John uses humour to deflect from his emotions. He tries to piss you off intentionally because he can't deal with his own shit and hates relying on anyone else. He can be a genuine bastard sometimes but others he's hiding something._

 _"_ _Bullshit." Renée snapped._

 _"_ _You mind your language luv." sniggered John as if he was the cleverest, wittiest man alive and hadn't had the shit kicked out of him earlier in the evening. "Geraldine could be listening."_

 _"_ _I know you're not okay. Chas has told me what you're like."_

 _The exorcist, demonologist and all-around asshole snorted. "Chas should learn to keep his gob shut."_

 _"_ _That's my husband you're talking about." Renée bristled defensively, forgetting the fact they were legally speaking, still separated._

 _"_ _Yeah? He's me best mate, I've known him longer than you have." John responded, almost competitively. God, he was such a child, needy, jealous and ridiculously stubborn. Then he seemed to deflate, slowing down, switching tracks from defiant and obnoxious to melancholy. "He's my only real friend left, isn't he?"_

 _"_ _What about that Zed girl? She seemed nice."_

 _So nice that Renée had told her to stay away from John Constantine for her own good. Had she heeded the warning? Had she left him? There was a time when that knowledge would have made Renée feel content but that time had long since passed, replaced by this awful situation with a half-naked Constantine on her sofa. She put the blanket back over him and he grunted non-committally._

 _"_ _Got her policeman boyfriend to run off with now hasn't she. Only a matter of time. Everyone leaves, or dies, 'cept Chas and no offence luv, he's a right idiot sometimes. Bloody awful taste in friends."_

 _For years – yes, it had been years – Renée had thought her husband was exaggerating John's issues. Had thought the other man was attention seeking if nothing else. Faced with the true extent of his self-loathing, she was having to re-evaluate previous encounters, things he had said at the time which had sounded arrogant but in retrospect carried the weight of his seemingly endless problems._

 _"_ _Chas is your friend. God knows I've disapproved of that at times, but the point is, he really cares about you." Renée had never known why Chas took the interest he did in John's welfare but now she was starting to understand._

 _"_ _More fool him." John muttered, staring up at the ceiling, beer drunk and discarded. He still seemed shaken from his nightmare._

 _"_ _You have a lot of bad dreams don't you?" she wasn't sure why she asked. Concern, most like. He nodded, blinking rapidly in the desperate pretence that he was_ _not_ _on the verge of tears. "What did you-" she cut off, realising she probably – definitely – didn't want to know._

 _The injured man answered tonelessly. "I saw Chas and Zed and you and Geraldine and-" he stopped, words sticking in his throat. "Astra. I saw you all dead, Renée. Cut up into little pieces and I was the one holding the knife. It was my fault."_

 _He was opening up to her, which suggested possible concussion if Renée was being honest, since she couldn't imagine any other time he would talk so openly. It was hard to see someone who seemed so confident become so vulnerable. The weight of that trust was almost impossible to bear, and she had to wipe tears from her eyes while he wasn't looking. These dreams, these horrific things; he saw them every time he closed his eyes. No wonder he drank so much. No wonder he smoked the amount he did. No wonder his entire life seemed like a quest to destroy himself – because every time he fell asleep, this happened._

 _It was then that her cell rang, Chas at last. John didn't seem to notice, just continued staring up at the ceiling. Stepping into the hallway and closing the door as quietly as possible, she answered._

 _"_ _Renée. I'm so sorry I missed you call earlier. Is everything okay. You and Geraldine, you're both okay?"_

 _"_ _Yeah, Chas, we're fine. It's just..."_ _Where to start?_ _"_ _John Constantine is semi-conscious on our sofa. He's in a bad way but he won't let me call an ambulance." she lowered her voice. "I think he was in a fight."_

 _"_ _Jesus Christ I'll be right there." said Chas, hanging up immediately. Leaving Renée alone again. Dammit. And then Geraldine decided to come downstairs at which point Renée gave up and decided to prepare some milk and cookies for a midnight snack that Geraldine insisted she had to share with beloved Uncle John, who practically snorted milk out of his nose at the absurdity of it. Geraldine had been rushed back upstairs before she could get her toy doctor's kit out and conduct medical tests on him; and before darling Uncle John could teach her any more colloquial British expletives. After that, John drifted off again, into troubled sleep, leaving Renée to her glass of wine that she had poured all that time ago. It felt like forever. There was no point in starting an episode now, not with John asleep at last, and besides, she suspected John would appreciate a show with that amount of lesbian activity in rather differently. Douchebag. What a fucking douchebag, coming into her home and ruining her night. She couldn't really be angry at him now though. She wasn't an utter bitch; she did have a heart. Though right now she wished she didn't because it_ _hurt._

 _It really fucking hurt._

 _It took a couple of hours for Chas to arrive. During that time, John had passed in and out of consciousness, taken a couple of painkillers and blacked out again, occasionally waking to make sarcastic remarks. Poor guy. He was trying so hard to be his usual arrogant self but it fell flat. Even beaten to a pulp, he was making poorly-timed, wildly inappropriate jokes and still complaining about being unable to smoke._ _He had tried to get up to go outside at have a cigarette, but he had neither cigarette nor lighter, and anyway, he had tripped and collapsed back onto the sofa again, where he was still sleeping when Renée heard Chas getting home. She went to greet him in the hall, pressing a finger to her lips to keep him quiet._

 _"_ _He's asleep right now." she whispered, hugging him tightly. "Peacefully, for once." she didn't mention the nightmares, figuring Chas already knew about them._

 _"_ _Dammit John." he muttered, then looked back to Renée. "I'm so sorry." her sort-of-ex-husband, though she wasn't sure what to define him as any more, whether he could be considered 'ex' anything. "You shouldn't have had to deal with this."_

 _"_ _No," she surprised herself with her answer. "I understand now why you can't leave him. He's a walking human disaster zone."_

 _"_ _He's also not deaf and would appreciate it if you ladies would keep your voices down when talking behind his back." came the shout from the living room. Chas smiled faintly, as if he had expected that to happen. The appalling sense of humour must have been comforting, a familiar indicator that yes, John was still alive, yes he'd be okay, and yes he was still an asshole. Some things never changed._

 _"_ _You go to bed, Renée, you look exhausted. I'll deal with him."_

 _Under any other circumstances, she would have been inclined to agree. But not tonight, not after all that had happened, all she had seen and heard. Tonight she was going to help._

 _Tomorrow she could hate John Constantine again, as she struggled through the day in a sleep-deprived haze and tried to get the blood off the sofa, but tonight..._

 _Tonight she would be there for him._


	2. John

**A/N: Because a guest asked and I can't answer anywhere else this is probably to be the last of this story. But I said that last time. So technically it's complete but you know me, I might end up writing more from Chas or Zed's POV. I doubt it though. Can't see where I'd take it. If I do get an idea in like three months time, you might end up with more but I really, really don't think so. Thank you for your patience with this anyway**

He woke up in an unfamiliar place, lying on someone's couch with an itchy tartan blanket over him. His head was throbbing, a low, steady beat, drums going off inside his head, the inescapable rhythm of those Membrane days. Every part of his body ached. _Oh fuck._ Garbled memories from the night before reminded him where he was; in stupidity or blind panic, he had sought refuge at Chas'. Renee. He had told her too much. He'd opened up. Bad fucking move, like everything else in his joke of a life. Well. No doubt he'd overstayed his welcome, time to be off, see if he couldn't, see if he couldn't get his cigs back from Renee first. A smoke, a shave, and maybe a shower, then he'd scrounge a lift back to the millhouse to 'recuperate' (read: drink until the pain in his head stopped being a result of his injuries and became alcohol related, til his body went numb and he stopped _feeling_ ). The smoking was non-negotiable. God, how did Chas survive living with Renee?

Groaning and clutching his badly bruised side, John hauled himself to his feet, stumbling clumsily into an exorcist-shaped heap on the floor.

"Oh bugger!" he hissed loudly, through strained teeth. A sound from the other room, remarkably like Chas dropping whatever he was doing (it sounded ceramic, the smashing noise of something connecting with the floor) and barging straight into the living room, as John tried to get himself back onto the sofa, to no avail.

Chas knelt down beside him and took him by the arm, aiding him over to the pile of cushions that had served as his bed for the night. Behind the big man, Renee stood with arms folded, her normally hostile face betraying concern. Wasted on him, for sure.

"John," Chas said, for possibly the third time – the exorcist's head was hazy, he wasn't really sure. That and he was too busy wallowing in endless fucking piles of angst and self-pity like the twat he was to actually listen, ha bloody ha! "How're you feeling?"

"Like a dead pig that's just been skullfucked by the Prime Minister," John muttered, his face completely expressionless. He smirked "Honestly mate, it's nothing, I've had worse days." A thought. "Where's my coat?"

"In the wash," snapped Renee. "Along with your other clothes." She looked exhausted. Dimly, John recalled a few loud, screaming nightmares that had woken the whole house, and inwardly cringed. Chas was going to mother him now. Chas was going to be worried about his mental health or some shit. Chas always fucking was, wasn't he?

"Not true," John retorted. "Still got me boxers on, haven't I? Although that could easily change..." he trailed off into coughing, cursing his shit sense of humour at times like this. Time for a topic change. "Where's Geraldine?" _Possibly not the greatest topic to discuss after mentioning a strip-tease, well done me._ His tone was as apologetic as he was comfortable being.

"At school. It's two in the afternoon."

Still early then. Probably better to leave now, before the child got home. Didn't want to further expand her vocabulary, did he now? Again, he tried to get up, only to be almost forcibly held down by his so-called best friend. " _John._ What happened?" His face was worried and compassionate, and John had to look away, staring up at the mottled off-white ceiling.

He shrugged. "Just the usual, Chas, you know me. Pissed off a couple of narrow-minded redneck arseholes who were gobbing off about the rampant tide of the gays. Told 'em what I thought of their views on 'sexual deviancy'."

"What did you say, John?" Chas growled in frustration, and John laughed, immediately regretting it because his ribs ached. Felt like bloody Nergal had done a neat little tap dance number on his chest. _Shit._ There was no way Chas'd let him smoke now.

"I said 'don't knock it 'til you've tried it', and winked at one of them. Absolutely didn't call him a pretty-boy." Chas glared. "What? Can't blame a man for trying." Shifting on the sofa awkwardly, the blond Scouser continued. "I also may have, you know, done the _thing._ " At this, Chas swore.

"What thing?" Renee asked curiously.

"Oh, nothing, just told one of them a story all about how he secretly liked dressing in women's clothes and his dad used to beat him 'til he pissed himself. Usual shit. Deadpan it, make your eyes go lifeless like, address some cunt you never met by name. Nine times out of ten, they leg it before you even finish."

"And the other 10% of the time you get the shit kicked out of _you._ " Chas finished. "Why do you always do this? Was it worth it?"

It was always worth it, John wanted to tell Chas, and it was _never_ worth it at the same time. Part of him knew he deserved it, and so pushed his luck at the worst possible moments, looked for opportunities to pick fights. And the other part of himelf hated the part that always had to rear its ugly head when most uncalled for. Like now When he really should have thanked them for their help, apologised for the intrusion and all the eldritch noises in the night.

Instead; "Oh, piss off Chas, I'll be right. Anyway, it would've gone worse if I hadn't put my cigarette out in someone's eye – not the closeted transvestite's, someone else's – cast a basic amnesia spell and got out of there. Took an hour or so to walk here."

"You did what?" Chas sounded outraged, Renee merely looked disapproving, as if she was all holier-than-thou now, as if she didn't smoke too, when no-one was around, and sneak occasional moments with one of the delivery guys when Chas used to go away on jobs with John. If he wanted to, John could really drop a bombshell, but no, there were limits even for him. He couldn't do that to Chas, not now the couple were 'making things right' (whatever the fuck that meant; judging by the array of flowers on the mantelpiece it involved delivering ornamental bouquets until your significant other was smothered to death in lilies, leaving you to slit your wrists with a romantic red rose).

"Okay, but in my defence, he was about to glass me at the time," John insisted.

"That wasn't what I meant," Chas admitted. "I was more surprised at the fact you walked here." The bigger man smiled and touched his friend's shoulder gently. "Soon as your clothes are clean, and you've eaten, and taken a sho- a _bath,_ I'll give you a ride back to the millhouse. I've already called Zed, she says she'll be there.

"Great. Just bloody great." muttered John fucking Constantine, bastard extraordinaire "All I need's Zed fussin' over me, making that bloody awful tea – with honey in it, for God's sake! What kind of idiot puts honey in tea?"

Secretly though, he was pleased, and Chas knew it, shaking his his head in exasperation and smiling. "I'll go get you a beer. Just the one, though."

He always said that. _Never mind_ thought John, _I'll just have to bat_ _my pretty little lashes and say something nice._ Though actually, with the two sizeable black eyes he was sporting that might prove hard than usual.

After Chas had gone, Renee lingered. The injured con-man and habitual down-and-out met her gaze and shrugged, wincing a little.

"'spose I should say thanks," he said after a while. "Renee. Thank you. And I'm sorry about- well, I'm sorry anyway. Please, do me a favour, don't tell Chas I said any of this, alright?"

"Sure," Renee nodded. "You have your reputation as asshole-in-chief to maintain. Can't be too forthcoming, can we now?"

Smirking, John sat up, gradually, uneasily leaning heavily onto the arm of the sofa, gripping it tightly until his knuckles turned white. "Exactly, luv. Exactly." He raised his voice "Oi, Chas, mate, hurry up with that beer, would you?"

"Only if you promise to keep your mouth shut around drunk rednecks in future." Chas replied from the other room, and John sniggered.

"I'll try," he lied, knowing full well he would do no such thing. Renee knew it too.

"Next time, take some sleeping pills will you? Your subconscious has serious issues, and I don't want to hear you screaming."

"Oh, don't worry, my conscious has issues too. In fact, my issues have issues of their own, copulating off and producing little bastard baby _issues._ "

Renee shook her head in wonder. "How do you do it? How do you keep on going, cracking shitty jokes and pretending everything's okay."

"You've got to laugh, haven't you?" said the Laughing Magician "Otherwise you've got nothing, absolutely sod all. See, that's the trick, that's _how_ you keep on going. Laugh in the face of Hell, toss a couple of cheap one-liners out and go wherever the synchronicity takes you. That's how."

At that moment, Chas came back in and John decided it was time to switch topics, reeling off some tired (but hilarious) succubus anecdotes, the usual bullshit. And he saw Renee smile, curled up next to Chas on the other settee, and he understood.

They were in love. Things were going so well. They didn't need him fucking it all up for them. It would be time to let Chas go soon, slowly weaning him off, eventually breaking off contact altogether. For the best really. As soon as the Rising Darkness was dealt with, he wouldn't need Chas (despite last night's evidence to the contrary). He wouldn't need to keep manipulating his friend, to keep _using_ him. They would be done.

And so John smiled, cracked a few shitty jokes, pretended everything was okay and kept on going. Because what else was there to do?

 _Sod all_ he thought bitterly, or, rather, _sod_ _it_ _all._

He couldn't let Chas know the decision he had come to. Chas wouldn't get it, he wouldn't _understand._ He'd go all protective and worry. So he didn't need to know this was it, he didn't need to know John Constantine, _John fucking Constantine_ , was discarding him, casting him aside. It wasn't like it didn't hurt John too. It hurt. It really fucking hurt.

But it was the way things had to be. You allowed yourself the luxury of friends, they'd get hurt, when you stumbled into their house after having the seven bells knocked out of you, when you got possessed by a demon-king, when you put them and their family at risk, making them look guilty by association. Chas didn't need this shit. And so that was that.

Decision made.

"John, hey, he looks even worse than you told me," Zed said, when they arrived at the millhouse later. "I made you some tea." Her smile was the wicked grin of a woman who knew full well what she had done. "With honey."

 _Why me?_ John thought, as he collapsed on the second sofa of the day _Why is it always me?_ What did he do to deserve friends like these, who wouldn't let him smoke and who made undrinkable tea?

What did he do to deserve _friends_?

Ah, life's great mysteries. Laying back on the couch, he smiled, his swollen face stinging. He sipped the tea. It wasn't as bad as he remembered.

Still. He complained on principle, because if there was one thing he needed, it was something to complain about. Zed laughed, then launched into a lecture about common sense and not getting himself killed, having some self-preservation (a nice concept, but very unrealistic in the real world) and John, well, John drifted off again, falling into troubled dreams of Astra Logue and the incident at Newcastle.

 _Bloody Newcastle –_ bloody in both senses of the word. _Bloody Nergal, bloody Rising Darkness, Manny, and bloody Hell on Earth._ None of them would let him sleep. There was no way out of it. And so he laughed, cracked a few shitty jokes and pretended everything was okay. Because that was all he knew how to do.

That was everything he was.

 _The Laughing Magician._

 _John Constantine._


End file.
